Wednesday, March 15, 2006

I had been seeing this odd band name ever where I looked online and had no idea who they were. I was immediately curious about a band calling themselves Death Cab For Cutie, but short of going to their website, which would have ended my curiosity infinitely sooner, I still hadn’t heard them. Then I was flipping stations on XM and finally ran head on into Soul Meets Body. I wasn’t immediately hooked, but the tune stayed with me and as I kept hearing it, I kept wanting to hear it more.

Nothing here is overdone. Lyrically, the album is intelligent and yet not pushy with it’s intelligence. The vocals, like the meanings, are subtle and understated yet not lacking in any way. The words are really poetry here and could live on their own outside the music…thankfully, they don’t have to. Instrumentally, the arrangements are breathy and sparse yet very intimate.

One of my favorite tracks is, I Will Follow You Into The Dark. One acoustic guitar and one voice. Very simple, very clean and amazingly tender lyrics.

The Tribe Is One

About Me

I was born in Bridgeport, Connecticut in 1972 which I believe puts me into the year of the Rat were I Chinese. I’m not, but even if I were I don’t know how I’d really feel about that. Let’s face it, the best thing about those place mats in Chinese restaurants is that someone has officially called my father a Cock and lived to tell about it. I, with great foresight on the part of my parents, was also born on May fifth or, as it’s commonly known to frat boys and my Mexican brothers and sisters, Cinco de Mayo. Little did I know as a child that I had the great fortune to share a birthday with the day the Mexican militia decided to whoop up on the French army in The Battle Of Puebla back in 1862 and not the Mexican Day of Independence…which certain tequila manufactures named Jose could care less if you knew about at all. The actual Mexican Day of Independence is September 16th. I kid you not, look it up if you don’t believe me.